About Me

I am a lawyer in Melfort, Saskatchewan, Canada who enjoys reading, especially mysteries. Since 2000 I have been writing personal book reviews. This blog includes my reviews, information on and interviews with authors and descriptions of mystery bookstores I have visited. I strive to review all Saskatchewan mysteries. Other Canadian mysteries are listed under the Rest of Canada. As a lawyer I am always interested in legal mysteries. I have a separate page for legal mysteries. Occasionally my reviews of legal mysteries comment on the legal reality of the mystery. You can follow the progression of my favourite authors with up to 15 reviews. Each year I select my favourites in "Bill's Best of ----". As well as current reviews I am posting reviews from 2000 to 2011. Below my most recent couple of posts are the posts of Saskatchewan mysteries I have reviewed alphabetically by author. If you only want a sentence or two description of the book and my recommendation when deciding whether to read the book look at the bold portion of the review. If you would like to email me the link to my email is on the profile page.

Sunday, February 21, 2016

A Quartet of John Le Carré

Having just read John
LeCarré
by Adam Sisman I have looked back at the short reviews I wrote of the four LeCarré
thrillers I read between 2001 and 2009. Below the reviews I have added comments
inspired by reading the biography.

****

40. – 90.) The
Constant Gardner by John LeCarré - His best book in years. Justin
Quayle’s investigation of his wife's death leads him around the world including
Saskatchewan. The author has a sense of our winter as he creates a fictional
(Saskatoon) Saskatchewan city. Often sad; always moving. It is a book that will
not be quickly forgotten. Probable hardcover (probable only because of some
recent novels). (Dec./01) (Second best
fiction of 2001)

I found the
Saskatchewan connection so unexpected in a book focused on Africa. I wondered
at the time how LeCarré could
write so knowledgeably about my province. Only after reading the biography did
I learn of his research which included travels to the places in which he set
his books. The biography does not say if he came to Saskatchewan. I remain
impressed that he could be accurate about one of the minor settings in his
books.

****

8. - 263.) Absolute
Friends by John LeCarré
– A brilliant stunning novel of Cold War and post-Iraq War espionage. Ted
Mundy, Pakistani born Englishman, and Sasha are 1960’s radicals in Berlin who
form a close friendship. Later Mundy becomes an English spy in order to bring
Sasha’s information from East Germany to the West. Actually each is a double
agent but ultimately both for the West. They fade into instant oblivion when
the Wall comes down in 1989. Mundy has built a simple life in Munich when,
after the Iraq War, he is drawn by Sasha into a venture to counter America’s
official world view. A shocking explosive pounding conclusion raises the
specter of disinformation and utter ruthlessness in America’s war on terrorism.
Personal loyalty betrayed by official deception. Better than The Constant Gardner. (Feb. 20/05) (Best fiction in 2005)

I had not
realized the level of critical backlash in America to Absolute Friends. It was generally considered a polemic reflecting
an anti-American attitude of the author.

In the New York Times the reviewer Michiko
Kakutani said it was “a clumsy, hectoring, conspiracy-minded message-novel
meant to drive home the argument that American imperialism poses a grave danger
to the world order”.

And here I
thought of it as a brilliant book that was my favourite book in 2005. I have
not changed my mind and remain content to be of the minority who thought it a
great book.

****

45.
- 455.) Mission Song by John
LeCarré
– Salvo, a Congolese zebra (white father and black mother) in London, is a
skilled linguist and interpreter. He can speak a pack of languages starting
with English, French and Swahili and including a variety from the Congo. The
English Secret Service hires him to translate at a meeting between a new
messianic leader for the Eastern Congo and representatives of three groups
within the area. As Salvo is leaving London his marriage is dissolving and a
new love affair commencing. At the conference Salvo skillfully handles his
official translations and listening to secret recordings of private
conversations. When he listens to some private conversations to which he should
not have listened, he learns the official purpose of a grand reconciliation of
the region under a charismatic leader is a façade for yet another grab at the
valuable mineral resources. Salvo is an idealist who seeks to prevent yet
another injustice perpetrated on his homeland by greedy foreigners. I feared as
bleak and bitter an ending as the The
Constant Gardner or Absolute Friends.
Salvo is dealt with more discreetly by the Establishment. Salvo is another
amazing character. Le Carre is such a master at creating fascinating characters.
It was a good but not great book. (Oct. 28/08)

The biography also revealed to me that LeCarré was a
linguist speaking English, German and French. His German skills reached the
level of being a translator. It is thus no surprise why the book is so
convincing about Salvo as an interpreter.

With its focus in Africa and
Europe the book was better received in America.

In The San Francisco Chronicle it was viewed as “more relaxed” and “less
strident” and that “LeCarré has regained his lighter touch”.

****

37.
- 500.) A Most Wanted Man by John LeCarré
– Issa Karpov, halfChechen / half
Russian, barely makes his way to Hamburg after being imprisoned and tortured in
Russia and Turkey. Issa denies he has been a Islamist radical. With the aid of
a Turkish family he manages to find Annabel Richter, a lawyer devoted to
helping immigrants seeking to stay in Germany. She is haunted by the
deportation of another young Russian and will not let it happen again. She
realizes Issa is no ordinary fugitive as he has particulars for a bank account
in Brue Freres, a private bank, run by Englishman Tommy Brue. It was an account
established by Issa’s corrupt father in the end days of the USSR. It is a
Lippanzer account – a black account which turns white just as the horses change
colour when they age. Richter seeks to find a way to keep Issa in Germany and
let him fulfill his dream of becoming a doctor. At the same time the multiple
German competing intelligence agencies have their eye on Issa and want to use
him for their own ends. The interested agencies expand to include those of
England and the U.S. I almost hate to read LeCarré’s
books. The recent works have been so grim in their endings. As I read this book
I dreaded what was going to happen to Issa. The cruelty of Western intelligence
in battling Islamic terrorism is frightening especially if you are
non-Caucasian and non-Western. If the book’s casual willingness to cast aside
laws is correct there is a depressing lack of difference between Western
democracies and the dictatorships of the rest of the world. There is no
humanity, only competition among the intelligence agencies. I am not sure I am
up to reading another Le Carre book. He does have the great talent shared by
P.D. James of creating amazing characters. I
know I will not forget Issa. It was a book to remember for my 500th
book of the decade. (Sept. 17/09)

It was A Most Wanted Man that ultimately kept me from reading another LeCarré
novel for 7 years. While I had coped with his visions of brutal intelligence
communities around the world in earlier books I found myself too discouraged by
A Most Wanted Man. It was not an
excessive amount of violence in terms of bodies that depressed me. LeCarré
does not fill his books with bodies. I stopped reading his books as I did not
want to accept that the current world of intelligence agencies was as vicious
as he portrayed. LeCarré’s
world was too bleak for me. I decided to read another after I read the
biography. I wanted to see if my reaction to LeCarré had
changed. I had an unread LeCarré book, The Night
Manager, above the computer. It was actually written before the above
books. My next posts will review and discuss the book.

14 comments:

How really interesting, Bill, to see your reviews in the light of what you learned from the biography you read. I must admit I like the linguistics angle you mention. And it's to his credit that he wrote so well about places he had visited. As to Absolute Friends, I also give credit for writing a book because it's a good book, not because he wanted to 'win points.'

Bill what an interesting post. I was asked to review the Le Carre biography, but decided not to take up the offer as I did not think I could make a fair assessment of the book. Firstly because I was rather ill, and frankly too ill even to read. I am just returning to health and watched the first episode of the TV version of The Night Manager last night. I now have the book and intend to read that in the next few weeks. The TV version I understand is much altered from the book.But my main reason was I had read A Most Wanted Man and like you was totally depressed by a narrative dripping with anti-Western attitudes, and his bleak view of the world. I think that writers of Le Carre's stature have a moral responsibility not too influence the young and impressionable to follow certain paths.

My father liked Le Carre's books. I remember him reading a few of them. Unfortunately, he didn't have the opportunity to continue on to read even more of them.

I haven't read them, saw the movie of The Constant Gardener. It is a good movie, well-done, good cast. Led me to look up the story inside the book. It was based on real events which did not become as violent as in the fictionalized version.

I think authors should write what they want to write. I mean I can't read Agatha Christie's books because I discovered at 19 that her books contained anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant bigotry which I could not read.

Plenty of people read her books. I can say that she was spreading bigotry which I find objectionable, but people read her books.

We have different standards on this. I'd rather not read about bigotry in any form being promoted as if it is the norm. I think authors shouldn't promulgate those views either.

Kathy D.: Thanks for the comment. I disagree with authors more often when they become strident in their prose. In particular, I take objection to legal mysteries where either the prosecutor or defence counsel is demonized.

Le Carre was harshly criticized in America for his perceived anti-American bias. Was it bigotry? I think not but generally I try not to judge a book just by attitudes expressed by characters.

I wouldn't judge Le Carre for that. I don't know the issues and don't think it was bigotry, but politics, his point of view.

I've lived here all my life and was brought up protesting war, bigotry, for civil rights and civil liberties, women's rights.

It's part of this country's history. And everyone has an opinion. And today lots of opinions about global politics, war, etc.

I'm talking about anti-Semitism, racism, anti-immigrant views that I objected to with Christie's books and others, too. That offends me as the grand-daughter of Jewish immigrants who fled pogroms in czarist Russia.

I think politics and intellectual debate is one thing, bigotry another.

I've read very little of his post-cold-war fiction, only the Constant Gardener that I can think of. I probably will read the Night Manager, as am watching the TV adaptation... will hold back on your review till I've read it.